MishedloMotto: “Today is the end, the end of the world.”Once again the monks, clad in their traditional sackcloth and ashes, gather on the top of the mountain to watch the conflagration. They have consulted their charts and the ancient texts of the pyramidic scrolls and they have come to the conclusion that today is the day…the end of the world.The leader consults his watch.“Three, two, one!”They join hands, close their eyes and chant together: “Now is the end, the end of the world.”Silence.Nothing.The leader opens his left eye. “That was GMT wasn't it?” he asks.Silence.“Well, lads, never mind. Same time tomorrow. We must get it right one of these days.”

LBYMMotto: “That's Living within your means…No, that's living Within your means…No, no, no, that's living within Your….”A woman shares her recently discovered secret. One can substitute many of the more expensive and exotic ingredients in Julia Child's “Art of French Cooking” recipes with a tablespoon of Crest toothpaste without significantly altering the taste. And the dishes leave your teeth clean and your breath smelling minty fresh. And it is good to have an emergency stash of Crest in the house anyway.Another poster responds that he does not use toothpaste, and if he did he would not keep an emergency stash, he would just go out and buy some.The rest of the thread is spent trying to figure out what is wrong with this guy, does he have really yellow teeth or bad halitosis or something. The thread concludes when still another poster mentions that this guy spends a lot of his time on various boards picking fights and everyone realizes that he probably does not have any teeth left so he is sensitive about the topic of toothpaste.

Political AsylumMotto: “Hand me my flame thrower, Myrtle, I am going out to explain things to these numbskulls.”The week is spent watching Republicans trying to defend/back away from/explain away comments by one of their most ardent spokespersons, Ann Coulter. Democrats giggle.The truly amazing posts are those by posters who seem to agree with Ann. How does anyone get that far away from humanity?But then, hang around Political Asylum for a day or two and you can see the spitting, pointing, shouting, purple faced, devout partisans from both sides gripping their flame throwers and dressed in their flame retardant suits.WARNING: Don't go here without first smearing yourself all over with SPF 2000.

Retire Early Liberal EditionMotto: “Mars meet Venus”Background: A group wanted to get away from all of the nastiness on that other Retire Early board so they started their own board! A festive atmosphere. Some discussion of retirement plans and goals.Fast-forward a week: Posters from the other board have apparently found it lonely and deserted, so they come over to the new board, bringing all of their political baggage with them.This week, a popular female poster on this board mentions that the stock market just went into the toilet. Another popular (male) poster points out that this is what happens periodically in the stock market and perhaps the female is not really suited for the kind of volatility blah blah. “WHAT!?! I made a simple OBSERVATION and you think you can tell ME…!” “Oh, come on, you KNOW that you always…”All of us are settling in for a good brawl when someone else says: “Mars meet Venus” and that bucket of cold water seems to end it.

Mechanical InvestingMotto: “Chart, spreadsheet, stats, numbers, analysis, stocks.”Question: “What are these guys doing at this website?”This week, following the aforementioned “Market is in the toilet” post one of the popular posters from Mechanical Investing produced a long post with lots of numbers showing something about stomach churning drops in the market followed by YEARS of recovery and demonstrated that once we are in free fall we will all hit the bottom with a splat unless we know what to look for in the charts and see in this spreadsheet…His earnest explanation drones on but I can no longer read because my stomach is churning and I am thinking maybe I need to revisit the Mars posts on the previous board to see what might be a better allocation…

Humor and Urban LegendsMotto: “Humor, but never offensive, urban legends but never political…NOT”This week a popular poster posted a puzzle that was the most difficult he had ever posted. It took hours to complete and at the end it turned out to be just a pile of Victoria's Secret underwear…with no babes.The howl was heard throughout Fooldom. There was some discussion of sending out a lynch party.